We all love our smartphones and tablets, but boy do we miss our big screens, mice, and keyboards when doing complex work on those mobile devices. That’s why the notion of a smartphone that acts like a PC when connected to those peripherals has kept recurring ever since the iPhone redefined mobility for the modern era.

But so far, reality has not delivered on that promise of the mobile-on-desktop notion. Now, Samsung is trying its hand at this puzzle, with the Dex dock available for its new Galaxy S8 and S8+ smartphones.

The journey from the Lapdock to the Dex Station

The Motorola Lapdock back in 2011 was the first dock to put smartphone screens on a computer monitor, as well as provide a full-screen browser and connections for physical keyboard, mouse, and other peripherals. But the constrained smartphone apps weren’t much easier to use as big-screen windows, and the Linux-based browser was too limited.